Listening for the Voice of Jesus

  

Listening for the Voice of Jesus

Reflections on John 10.11-18

 

RCL Easter 4B

25 April 2021

 

Holy Trinity Anglican Cathedral

New Westminster BC

 

Stop that music!

            When most of us hear someone mention a hymn, we tend to hear the tune first and then perhaps to recollect the words.  Despite the best efforts of musicians and seminary professors over the decades, this tendency to confuse ‘hymn’, the text, with ‘tune’, the music to which the words are sung, persists.

            I have a vivid memory of an ordination I attended in 1980.  When the time came to sing Veni Sancte Spiritus, the ancient hymn invoking the Holy Spirit that has become a fixed element of Anglican ordination rites, the organist began to play the ‘other’ tune for the hymn rather than the tune usually played.  The ordaining bishop whose nickname among us seminarians was ‘Wild Bill’ looked up, glared at the organist and shouted, ‘Stop that music!’

            After a seemingly endless period of silence, ‘Wild Bill’ began the ordination prayer with his hands stretched out over a very shaken ordinand.  For months afterwards we teased this poor fellow by telling him that he really hadn’t been ordained because we never sang the Veni Sancte Spiritus as the rite required.  I do feel a little guilty about this because years later he left the Episcopal Church to become a monk on Mount Athos in Greece!

 

I heard the voice of Jesus say.

            One of my favourite hymn is ‘I heard the voice of Jesus say’, Hymn #508 in Common Praise, our current Anglican hymn book.  I’m sure that many of you know it as well, but what tune is used to sing these words can evoke different reactions to the text.

            Since 1938 at least, Canadian Anglicans have sung the hymn to ‘Kingsfold’, a lovely English folk tune popularized by Ralph Vaughan Williams and set in the key of G major.

 

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

“Come unto me and rest;

lay down, thou weary one,

lay down thy head upon my breast.”

I came to Jesus as I was,

so weary, worn and sad;

I found in him a resting place,

and he has made me glad.

 

It’s a hopeful tune, set in a bright key, almost spring-like in its effect on the singer.

 

            Since 1940 at least, those of us who grew up in Anglicanism south of the border sang the hymn to a more somber tune by Thomas Tallis, one also beloved of Ralph Vaughan Williams, called ‘The Third Tune’ (Common Praise #191) and set in the key of C major.

 

I heard the voice of Jesus say,

“Behold, I freely give

the living water; thirsty one,

stoop down and drink and live.”

I came to Jesus and I drank

of that live-giving stream;

my thirst was quenched,

my soul revived,

and now I live in him.

 

It’s more meditative, almost autumn-like in its character.

            Same words, different tunes.  Same voice, different emotions.  But one common goal:  listening for the voice of Jesus.

 

Listening for Jesus in the Elevator of Our Lives

            We long to hear the voice of the good Shepherd who will lead us into our long-hoped-for united humanity, into those pastures green where all the flock are well-fed and watered.  But listening for the voice of the Shepherd in a world of different, sometimes clashing, tunes feels like being in a vast elevator that never stops at our floor and that we cannot escape as we are besieged with an endless loop of banality and deception.

            Advertisers fill every nook of the media with pitches for their products.  Political parties test clever but meaningless slogans on focus groups.  Demagogues use all the words that trigger our fears and anxieties, while they ridicule our ‘better angels’ as naïve and unachievable.  How do we listen for the voice of the good Shepherd in such a cacophony?

            The apostle Paul in his letter to the Galatians suggests the ‘tunes’ we should listening for, if we want to hear the good Shepherd (Galatians 5.16-26).

 

• If we hear a hymn being sung to the tune of self-giving love, joy and peace, then it’s quite likely the Shepherd is singing to us.
• If we hear a hymn being sung to a tune that fills us with a longing for patience, kindness and generosity, it may well be the Shepherd serenading us.
• If we hear a hymn calling us to faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, let’s mark the tune and embrace the Singer, for it’s very likely Jesus who is calling to us.

 

In all times and in all place, the Shepherd is singing such hymns to us, in many and varied tunes, in the hopes of catching us aware and attentive.

 

Training the ear.

            Listening for the voice of Jesus takes practice and a commitment to the life-long training of the ear of the soul and the will of the heart.  That’s why we gather week after week, whether on-site or on-line, to hear the Word and to break the bread of life and to pour the wine of compassion.  We’re learning how to listen for the Voice that brings us home and that sets us free to be fully alive in the one flock of the living God.